adventures; annotated.

Interlude: FIENDS In Tokyo

Music has always been my saving grace. No matter what I’ve been doing, where I’ve been, how I’ve been feeling, or what I’ve been creating, music has always been the one thing that can pluck me out of my feelings and drop me anywhere I need to be.

Aside from my How-To’s, I will be launching another 2 (for now) re-occurring segments on this website; 1 which I will launch a little later, and 1 called Interlude. The Interlude will serve as random intermissions in my regularly scheduled postings to talk a bit about music in some form, and how it is affecting me on my travels. This might be some tunes that I’ve been listening to a lot (compiled into a playlist for y’all), or some insights from some of my favorite artists, or something else completely. We’ll keep working at it.

Welcome to The Interlude.

Interlude: FIENDS In Tokyo

One of my favourite artists, who made one of my favourite albums of last year recently made the journey to Japan to film a few new music videos (and hopefully work on some new music as well – I can only assume the constant cultural saturation of a place like Japan must to wonders for the creative process). That artist, Bas, joined by his FIENDS crew, teamed up with videographer Scott Lazer to create the new mini-documentary “FIENDS in Tokyo”.

Serving as another look into the mind of the late-blooming 29 year old Queens-based rapper (he only started rhyming 5-6 years ago), the doc follows Bas, Cozz, and co. while they explore the city, speaking on the culture, the love they receive, and the importance of travel – with a few quirky moments along the way. All in all, it’s an easy 9-minute watch with some stunning visuals.

For me, what really got caught my attention was a certain voice of at the end by the aforementioned Dreamville artist Cozz on the significance of travel. He says:

I know I’ve been fed a lot of lies about the world growing up, and every time I travel I get to see for myself… what it’s really about, and what there is to learn about other people and other cultures, and what there is to respect about ’em and try to incorporate to your own. And at the end of the day, travel is the best form of education because you can get to the real.

I think we have to just get out of the bubble. All these bubbles that keep people apart are really just built off of misinformation and propaganda, and all types of ways that people’s thinking is manipulated. When you actually have the experiences for yourself, or give someone else that experience that they’ve never had, you’re shattering all those stereotypes and breaking people out of their bubble. Everyone should at least attempt to do that for your own growth, and of course for the next man… I’ve never in life regretted spending on travel. You never do. You’ll have those experiences that really help shape who you are, who you’ll become, and the way you view the world.

As you can probably tell, Bas is an incredibly bright man, and I’d urge you to check out the rest of that article, here, where he talks more about his fascination with Toyko, the Trump travel ban, and his upcoming work.

For me, something about Bas and his personality & thoughts has an innate effect on me. Hell, before I even began my travels, one of his lyrics became a permanent reminder to myself to go out and explore. I got the words “clouds never get old” tattooed, and I knew immediately that the line was special to me even before I understood what he meant by it. When I finally got the fortunate chance to ask Bas about to line during a Genius Q&A on Twitter he explained, “I fly often on road, but somehow that moment when you break the clouds and come up over them just never gets old.” That was all I needed to hear.

Now, no matter which city I wake up in, or which coastline I’m watching the cotton candy clouds as the sun goes down, I always remember that there is so much more to see.

Go check out the 2 videos that Bas shot while in Japan, including one for possibly my favourite off of the tape in “Live For“, and also for the introspective “Penthouse“, live on Vevo now.